Mass Effect 2 - Editorial Discussion RPG or Not @ Bitmob

February 16th, 2010, 12:57

Originally Posted by Maylander
Also, his example of Throw is fairly bad. While he is entirely right that 12 ranks vs 4 ranks is irrelevant, that was never the problem. The problem is that ME1 Throw at the highest rank is capable of annihilating armies, while the ME2 version is still perfectly mediocre; something to use for fun or to take out Husks (at least on Hardcore/Insanity where all enemies have armor/barrier/shields).

I used Throw a lot, especially on insanity. It recharges instantly and disables a foe for a few seconds, potentially a whole group. With the right character you smash through armor/shield really fast, but some opponents regenerate health quickly so it takes more time to take out health. So what you do is you just break their armor/shield after which you throw and move on to tear down the next. Throw is homing and needs nothing more than hurling it and when it hits it do damage to nearby opponents.

You may ask, "why don't you just shoot them, they have no armor"? Because while shooting you take damage, both from the one you shoot at and the others nearby. It's more effective to quickly blast armor/shields and then disable the foes than blast armor/shields/health one by one.

Also, damage on a foe on the ground takes far more damage from a shot. Why waste ammo?

-- Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind. - John F Kennedy
An eye for an eye, and soon the whole world is blind. - Mahatma Gandhi
The world is my country. To do good is my religion. My mind is my own church. This simple creed is all we need to enjoy peace on earth. - Thomas Paine

Originally Posted by JemyM
I used Throw a lot, especially on insanity. It recharges instantly and disables a foe for a few seconds, potentially a whole group. With the right character you smash through armor/shield really fast, but some opponents regenerate health quickly so it takes more time to take out health. So what you do is you just break their armor/shield after which you throw and move on to tear down the next. Throw is homing and needs nothing more than hurling it and when it hits it do damage to nearby opponents.

Whenever you face organic enemies, bring Jacob or Grunt with Squad based Incindiery Ammo. No regeneration. I always do that. Also, I always bring someone with Squad based Disruptive ammo (i.e Zaeed) when facing synthetic enemies. Basically stun locks them, allowing your NPC followers to do all the killing without breaking a sweat.

Even Insanity is smooth sailing with a little preperation.

Originally Posted by JemyM
You may ask, "why don't you just shoot them, they have no armor"? Because while shooting you take damage, both from the one you shoot at and the others nearby. It's more effective to quickly blast armor/shields and then disable the foes than blast armor/shields/health one by one.

Maybe we're playing a different game. Exactly what enemies are solid with no protection, yet have fragile protection (except those blasted Husks that I consider so annoying)? Most enemies I've faced that were worth talking about - Commandos, Vanguards, Mechs, Geth, Harbinger, most Collectors etc - have rock solid defenses, but are killed with a few shots once they only have their health bar left. In fact, taking down their defense is the whole fight - once that is done, NPCs with a little firepower (Zaeed, Legion, Thane, etc) will take out enemies really fast.

Originally Posted by JemyM
Also, damage on a foe on the ground takes far more damage from a shot. Why waste ammo?

Just remember to switch weapons a lot. Picking up ammo will restock all your weapons, so if you empty every weapon you have, you still only need a few ammo clips to fill it all up again. The only weapon I actually run out of ammo with is the Sniper Rifle, because I tend to use it way too much, as it kills so redicilously fast. Other than that, I just keep juggling the weapon type and am never in any danger of running out due to how the ammo clip system is designed. You litteraly get 3 or even 4 times as much ammo per clip if you just juggle enough.

An example to those who find it hard to understand the ammo system:
- You start the fight by taking out 3-4 rocket troopers in the back with a Sniper Rifle.
- You continue by taking out some mid-range people with an Assault Rifle.
- The few enemies that are left, actually made it fairly close, so you blast them in the face with a Shotgun.

All you need at this point is two ammo clips and you're back to 100% ammo with all weapons, since they all regenerate as if only one of them had lost ammo.

Just because an apple is not an orange, doesn't mean that it's still not a fruit.

BioWare is just doing something different, DA:O and it's success should show that they are not abandoning the more traditional approach. It's a different story, told in a different way, and works for the game.

As much as I love all my "classic" CRPGs, there comes a point where you feel like you are playing the same game over and over with a sprite swap.

Originally Posted by Maylander
Maybe we're playing a different game. Exactly what enemies are solid with no protection, yet have fragile protection (except those blasted Husks that I consider so annoying)? Most enemies I've faced that were worth talking about - Commandos, Vanguards, Mechs, Geth, Harbinger, most Collectors etc - have rock solid defenses, but are killed with a few shots once they only have their health bar left. In fact, taking down their defense is the whole fight - once that is done, NPCs with a little firepower (Zaeed, Legion, Thane, etc) will take out enemies really fast.

Different class. You aim, shoot, kill. Sentinels don't. As Sentinel you do not need to aim to take armor/shields down, you drop the defenses really fast, without the need to aim and without risk. However, once health is exposed you actually have to actually kill them. Unless you just want to throw warp (takes time), throw really speeds up the effort. It also gets me out of danger quite often, once the armor/shield is gone I send them to the ground, which means that even if my screen is bloody red, I am safe.

Originally Posted by Maylander
Just remember to switch weapons a lot.

Soldier tip. Not so useful when playing a weapon-limited class. I have no shotgun/assault rifle. I am stuck with sniper rifle if I want to play safe. I use SMG's in close range and when facing heavy opponents and I just want to blast their shields faster. I use heavy pistol once in awhile to save ammo. It works well when you can aim with mouse and run the game in 2048x1536 resolution (which the AI isn't built for really, I can usually headshot from safe range with opponents just standing there taking it).

-- Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind. - John F Kennedy
An eye for an eye, and soon the whole world is blind. - Mahatma Gandhi
The world is my country. To do good is my religion. My mind is my own church. This simple creed is all we need to enjoy peace on earth. - Thomas Paine

This shift represents the streamlining - not the amount of ranks of any given skill. Sure, skills can be useful, but only the Sentinel can actually rely on their skills more than weaponry - even Adepts and Engineers are forced to use weapons more than skills.

One out of six classes simply proves my point. In ME1 it was the other way around - only the Soldier relied heavily on weapons. Everyone else could rely on their powers/skills.

In fact, even the Soldier class was vastly improved when you gave it Lift or Singularity as a special skill at the start of the game.

tl;dr version: No, because good writing and acting alone does not a RPG make. It just makes a good FPS.

Normal version: One of the reasons why I play RPGs is for complexity. If I don't want complexity I play something else. Dumbing it down makes it either a bad RPG or a good FPS, take your pick. Since I like the ME universe (ME1 > ME2 imho) I tend to want to look at it like a good FPS. It takes more than good writing and dialogue to call it a RPG.

I tend to replay RPGs a few times (been through DA:O 5 times so far from start to finish) but I only play FPS once and awhile. Once I finished ME2 I've had no desire to replay it and I doubt I'll mess with any of the DLC that comes out for it.

It took me a few days to figure out why since the acting and writing are both very compelling, then it hit me: the mechanics are not that of a RPG. Any two characters of any class are always going to be almost the same thing, and that's an FPS, not a RPG.

I just hope that Bioware pulls back on the 'streamlining' by about 75% for ME3.

"Let's face it, just about every RPG with a more complex leveling system has introduced tiers in some way. Oblivion did it, Fallout 3 did it, Dragon Age did it…it's necessary for the developers to tell their players, "Yes, there really is a concrete difference between a Science score of 47 and 50!" Otherwise, progression would be so abstract and subtle that no one would be able to tell they were progressing, and where's the fun in that?"

This part I disagree with. I love it when in a game I spend time to upgrade my skills and slowly start to notice how the enemies I fight get easier to kill. That is the feedback I like. If the increase is too big I get bored, because the game gets too easy and the difficulty will be too random. If it was too small, I guess it could get boring as well, though…

That is one part I loved about BG1 and BG2: the spells. The spells were a continuum from quite useless to over-powered, but it didn't matter since they were bought with money, which was easy to come by. I could try a completely different tactic the same fight. Sometimes it worked, and sometimes it didn't work, but that was part of the charm.

Originally Posted by Ransak
I tend to replay RPGs a few times (been through DA:O 5 times so far from start to finish) but I only play FPS once and awhile. Once I finished ME2 I've had no desire to replay it and I doubt I'll mess with any of the DLC that comes out for it.

*Scratches head*

You've played through Dragon Age 5 times and finished ME2 since mid-December?

I still haven't finished DA:O, but that's because I left it almost finished (probably just 5 hours or so to go) when I left for my Thanksgiving-Christmas trip (6 weeks), and when I got back, King's Bounty 2, Star Trek Online beta and Mana Khemia 2 (PS2) were there waiting for me. Hopefully one day I'll get down to finishing DA:O.